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Move over Porter and Handy; step in Plato and Descartes. Melbourne Business School in Australia has appointed a philosopher-in-residence to help out its business students in some of the trickier aspects of corporate management.

John Armstrong has been appointed associate professor at the school with the brief of sharpening students’ analytical, communications and decision-making skills by encouraging clarity and precision of thought.

“Great institutions bring great minds together for a great clash of ideas,” says John Seybolt, dean of MBS. “Given the size and structure of Melbourne Business School, it has the flexibility and freedom to appoint a philosopher-in-residence to further enrich the intellectual life at our School.”

Prof Armstrong is a thoroughbred philosopher, educated in the UK at Oxford, Birkbeck College and University College London. He moved to Australia in 2001 and since 2003 has been an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Melbourne.